


Fell Down to My Knees

by Port



Category: Supernatural
Genre: AU ending to S3, Crossroads mythology, Gen, Greek Mythology - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-07-18
Updated: 2009-07-18
Packaged: 2018-03-04 04:03:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2908643
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Port/pseuds/Port
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam and Dean are driving as far as that last mile will take them. Alternate ending to S3.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fell Down to My Knees

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Smilla](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Smilla/gifts).



> (1) A birthday fic for Smilla, inspired by her extraordinary artwork [here](http://community.livejournal.com/policromo/6479.html#cutid1) (might be spoilery for the fic!). (2) My thanks to tygers for the very helpful beta. (3) A link to info on the mythology involved follows the story. (4) Some readers have seen this as a deathfic, but I'm not so sure. Fair warning either way. (5) Comments are always treasured, good and bad.

"That's a big chick," Dean murmurs, only half interested in the very tall woman standing at the roadside. She's easily as tall as Sam, maybe taller, with a curvy figure proportional to her height. Her presence in the first place makes her notable; it's sunset on a far-out back road. Clumps of trees are darkening, while the tall grass glows yellow-gold. Maybe she's waiting there on the corner of the intersection for someone to come for her. Some dude in a pick-up, or a daughter or son. Dean just hopes their car is big enough for her.

Sam is asleep with a book on his lap. They're on their way to Pensacola, to see a wise man of some religion or other. They've interviewed a lot of holy men and women; Dean can't keep them all straight. He slows as he passes the strange woman, not wanting to whiz past her like a jerk. Up close, in her loose-fitting tunic of a shirt and gracefully draping skirt, she's taller than he thought, almost a giant.

She turns her head to follow him as he approaches and passes. Dean can't look away; he watches her in the rear view until the curve of the road takes him away.

~~

Every leader of the monotheistic religions Sam and Dean talk to says the same thing: Love God, do good, and the evil beings you are dealing with will have no sway over your soul.

Dean wishes he could believe it, but he's never seen God or an angel. He has seen demons, though, and the world is full of them. It's an evil place, except for some good people, some of whom he's met. He figures all the good people in the world must balance out all the demons, and the evil sons of bitches who happen to be human. And if that's true, then maybe the world doesn't need a God. Maybe it's an even match without Him.

Dean never says so to the priests, imams and rabbis. He doesn't mention the possibility to Sam either.

Cruising down Ventura Boulevard around midnight, Dean figures it's the best time to ditch L.A. No traffic clear up to Malibu and beyond. They can hang out in a coastal town up north while Sam digs up some mystics and witches. They're both fed up with mainstream religion for now. They probably haven't turned every single stone in this massive circuit-board of a city, but close enough and nothing to show for it. 

He slows a bit as they near Sepulveda, even though he has the light and the streets are empty. A few blocks back, some guy in a tiny red Beemer passed him going a hundred and thirty, easy. The eight-lane backbone of the Valley holds the same temptation as the loneliest seventy-five-mile-per-hour stretch in West Texas, except here there're cops around to catch you testing your speedometer. Dean takes it easy, on the lookout for idiots racing each other down the cross-streets.

The light catches him there at Sepulveda, which acts as the border between a few zip codes and "cities" (Sherman Oaks and Van Nuys, he thinks. Or maybe Sherman Oaks and Bel Air. He can't keep them all straight.) It's where Sepulveda stops being a twisty hill road and gets its act together, bisecting the Valley and creating right angles with Ventura. 

All the storefronts and eateries are closed and dark, neon unblinking and anachronistic, evoking every black and white detective flick Dean's ever watched. From ahead on the left, he imagines he can hear the round fountain up the steps to the Galleria; well behind them, a late night bus applies its air brakes, creeping along the side of the road to an empty stop. Aside from the freak show in Hollywood and the theme parks, and that one delicatessen chain he can never remember the name of, this is what Dean likes best about the whole godforsaken city, the way it shuts the hell up, most places anyway, after dark.

Idling with Sam brooding beside him, Dean glances aside and does a double-take. That is one big chick, he thinks, the observation familiar. She's standing on the southeast curb, to his left, looking right at him with luminescent gray eyes. She must be seven and a half, eight feet tall. (Dean hesitates to estimate her at nine, because that's almost impossible.)

She has shoulder-length hair, ruddy brown, and an ankle-length dress, both draping motionlessly in the breeze.

Dean frowns. The word preternatural comes to mind. Neither he nor she looks away.

"Dude, it's a green. Let's go." Sam knocks him on the shoulder. "Quit flirting."

Dean snaps out of it and gives the woman an embarrassed smile. He hadn't meant to stare. She probably gets that a lot, woman of her size and gravity. With a nod to her, he turns back to the road. Without traffic, it's always a good drive, and he sets himself to enjoy it. They might not get back to L.A. before his time runs out.

~~

They outrun the FBI one last time the day Dean's year ends. Dean takes Sam up into the middle of nowhere, climbing high into the redwood forests where the air grows chilly and damp and smells like peat moss and pine. The grade of the road has him shifting back and forth between low gears, and eventually he finds a way where there's no pavement at all, nor road signs. The sun hasn't quite set, but it's dark under the tent of the treetops, and Dean is surprised he still has it in him to wonder at the girth of their stolid trunks, their height.

They go a ways, slowly, cautiously. Their cell phones gave up long ago. Dean swallows at the thought of leaving without saying goodbye to Bobby, though he doesn't think he could have made that call anyway. What would he have said?

Sam's hands are fisted on his thighs, back pressed against the seat. He's staring forward, and Dean doesn't think he's looking at the trees. He's looking into the future. Dean wants to say, "Don't write me off so soon. I've still got a few hours. We'll figure something out." But that would be cruel. He has until midnight. Game over.

"I'm sorry," Dean says.

His eyes don't veer from the road, but in the periphery Sam turns his head to the left and says nothing. Dean promises himself he'll use his last few hours after they stop to look back at Sam, memorize his face and his stupid shaggy hair and the way his arms and legs move. He has a fear, low down in his belly, of forgetting Sam, and he's determined to remember him ten thousand years from now, a hundred thousand. Even if all he can recall by then is the shadow of an eyelash, the nail of his pinky finger.

At any rate, Dean knows where he's going. But the FBI really means it now, and he doesn't think Sam will be safe anywhere for long.

"You should get out of the country," he says. "One of those places without an extradition agreement. How's your Spanish?"

" _Asi-asi_ ," Sam answers, voice dull and sharp at the same time. "We'll go together. _Junto_."

Sam's barely listening to himself, still staring into the darkening forest. " _Junto_ ," Dean repeats. "Yeah."

He has a couple of passports with his and Sam's pictures in them. He'll throw his away and make sure Sam knows where to find his own.

The road gets more treacherous. It's barely distinguishable, carpeted with brown-orange needles slick with moisture. Dean slows to five miles an hour. He follows the turns carefully, and keeps going long after there's any hope of finding an empty cabin or old logger's shack. The vicinity might not have ever been touched, except for when someone in another lifetime cleared the narrow road. Every once in a while, they pass a tributary leading a few hundred yards into the woods, interrupted by trees that fell long ago. Dean's surprised they've made it this far, and a little worried about ever finding a turnaround. 

He's just about resigned himself to the thought of Sam backing the car halfway down without help when he looks ahead and slows to a stop. There in the middle of the dirt path is a sapling. Redwood, judging by the bark and burgeoning leaves on the thin branches. Dean could encircle the widest part of the trunk with one hand, and it's as tall as Sam. Young. Chose a hell of a spot to put down roots, right there in the middle of the road. Dean sets the parking break. They seem to have traveled their final mile.

He and Sam sit in the car for a bit, until Dean's stomach rumbles. Sam finally gives Dean a smile. "Let's see what's in the trunk," he says, voice modulated not to crack. 

The doors squeak as they open, and Dean thinks he might finally oil them before he goes. It's always been a comforting sound, though, in its familiarity. Maybe he'll forget to do it again.

Sam opens the trunk and Dean grabs a couple of stolen motel pillows and blankets and arranges them in the back seat. Sam might want to rest afterward. 

In the not-quite dark, he and Sam lean against the trunk and chew on candy bars and beef jerky. They have some canned food, but not enough to last Sam much longer than a day. He'll have to become a mountain man if he wants to stay up here. Dean thinks Sam would starve if he tried, so he'll probably venture back into civilization and live life on the run. Dean hopes Sam doesn't do anything stupid.

He could sit on the trunk all night and lie back and listen to the small sounds of the forest settling in to sleep and waking up for the night, and with Sam there with his thigh pressed against his, that would be all right. But Sam's not all right, and so Dean's not all right either.

He nudges Sam. "Come on. Let's go for a walk."

Sam gazes at him and looks away and shrugs. "Lead on."

Dean does. He resolutely does not look back at the Impala as he takes Sam past the bold sapling blocking the car and follows the path up and around a bend. The path here is fit only for walking, the edges overgrown with mandrake and pale blue belladonna. They tromp around still puddles and stop here and there to look closer into the surrounding wood. Dean thinks he sees an owl dart between two trees, each easily the width of the car, which he wishes he could see one last time. He's squinting into the distant branches when Sam grabs his arm.

"You hear that?"

"What?" Dean asks. He listens to the forest and only hears the distant, bass howling of the hellhounds. They've been at it for a week or so, on and off, meant to scare. Dean is plenty scared, but with great effort, he's managed to compartmentalize it and almost ignore the baying that only he can ascertain. Except, by the wideness of Sammy's eyes, he's noticed it as well.

Dean bites his lip. All the literature says only the victim can hear the hellhounds. He opens his mouth to demand what Sam did when the timbre changes. The pitch rises into a more natural tone, the notes shortening into yips and barks. No longer threatening. More like a pack of dogs on the move than a few hellhounds on the hunt.  They're coming closer too, close enough that he can make out the padding of their feet on the turf, the snap of thin branches. Sam's hand squeezes Dean's arm. They've left their weapons in the car, except for a few knives.

"Are those the—"

"No, I don't think so. I mean, they haven't sounded like—"

"Dean." Sam pulls him to face farther down the path.

And there she is. 

Up close, she's easily ten, eleven feet tall. A giant, Dean thinks. She's young and old, something in between, gray-eyed and olive-skinned. Mediterranean hair, brown-gold-luminous, falling in waves across her shoulders. She's wearing a white dress with a leather belt settled over round hips, the dress generously folded and falling vertically from the collar and shoulders and waist, down past her ankles, not quite hiding her barefoot toes, like the women's version of a toga. Only this isn't a costume. He can tell.

"You," he says. "You were in L.A. And…" He can't remember what state that back road had been in. "Out there in Bumfuck, Middle America. Who are you?"

She waits a full minute before answering, long enough for Dean to take in her poise and stature. Regal. He and Sam look at each other. Sam is inscrutable. He's thinking fast.

"I frequent the crossroads," she says at last. Dean darts a look around. Sure enough, a path behind her breaks from the trail, climbing up a steep incline. He wouldn't have noticed it, but it's a three-way crossroad, out here at the top of the mountain. "You," she intones, pointing at Sam. Sam steps forward, a little in front of Dean until Dean steps up and pushes him a little out of the way. Idiot. "You killed the one who had usurped my sacred places."

"I know who you are," Sam says, not quite awed, but definitely enthralled. Dean can relate. They've never met or seen one of these. That scarecrow vanir a few years back is the closest they've ever come, and that was close enough. You don't deal with something on this level without sacrifice. The demons had learned the art of exchange from someone.

She inclines her head slightly at Sam's words. "Few do, in these late times. Ask me for what you want."

The dogs are here. They trot amid the trees, panting and calm. One jumps out into the clearing and makes for the woman. Tail wagging, it sits at her feet. It's part black lab, part mutt. She smiles down at it and catches Dean staring. "They keep your enemies away. Ran them off."

Ran off the hellhounds. Dean has always been a dog person. He smiles slightly, knowing this moment of safety is only that. "Sam," he murmurs. "Be careful." It's late in the game. He has three hours and no alternatives, no one else to grill for info, no more books to scan in search of clever tricks, and they all end sad anyway, each and every story. He knows he's never coming down off this mountain. Or maybe he is.

Sam steps forward, and this time Dean doesn't follow. He clears his throat. "Dean not to die or go to Hell. I want that. And I want us to always be together."

"Sam, no—" Sam has dreams, damn it. He doesn't need Dean his whole life, not like Dean needs him.

Sam turns to him and smiles fondly, near tears again. "Shut up, Dean."

"This is a good request," she says, and it is. It's a damn good request. Too good for Dean. She motions them to follow and climbs up the almost hidden path. Dean follows Sam, in case he stumbles, and they walk, gripping trees roots for balance, sending dirt falling. Dean gets some in his hair but doesn't mind. It's almost too dark to see, except that the woman radiates a gentle light. When the ground evens out, the sun has completely set, and Dean reaches for Sam's hand, isn't surprised when Sam holds his just as tight.

The dogs meet them in a clearing surrounded by the largest redwoods Dean has ever seen, and that is very large indeed. They hold up the night sky, like pillars. White stars twinkle down at them, as though waving.

"Where are we?" Sam asks.

"Between," she says. In the distance, Dean hears the hellhounds again. They're coming nearer, but the dogs are on alert, sitting coiled on their haunches, facing outward. Dean realizes he's still holding Sam's hand. Their palms are sweaty against each other. Sam moves his pinky finger between Dean's pointer and middle fingers.

"Stay here," she says, gazing at their enjoined hands. "My dogs will protect you. In two hours, I will fulfill your request."

She turns to go, and Sam yells _Thank you_ after her. Dean once again wonders how he grew up so polite. In a moment, the woman's glow is hidden by the darkness of the forest, and she's gone.

Dean pushes Sam, and their hands come apart as he's knocked away. "You're an idiot, you know that? What the hell kind of request was that?"

"Thought you didn't want to die just now. Sorry." Sam gravitates back into Dean's space, and Dean's inclined to keep him there. 

"You know what I'm talking about. You're gonna be sorry one day."

"Maybe if you keep playing the same music the rest of your life, but otherwise, I think I'll deal."

Dean rolls his eyes and looks around the clearing. Ample star-light shows him a large, grassy space. At the edges, nestled in the serpentine roots of the redwoods—which seriously have to be more than a few thousand years old—are some poisonous plants he recognizes as also having medicinal properties.

"Dean, look," Sam calls from close by. He points to a stone figurine that clearly depicts the woman (not entirely a woman) who brought them here. It gives her three faces.

Sam and Dean respectfully take a few steps back, and wander to the middle of the clearing. "Kind of gives new meaning to the term _deus ex machina_ , huh?"

Sam throws him a disparaging grimace. "Actually, it pretty much reinforces the original meaning, Dean."

"The original meaning had to do with stagecraft, genius," Dean says, giving himself away a little and shocking Sam into silence for a few satisfying moments. He lies down on his back in the grass. Sam follows, sitting with his legs folded by Dean's head. They bicker for a time as the hellhounds draw near. Dean looks at his watch. "Ten minutes," he says. "Do you think…?"

"I don't know. Whatever it is, it's got to be better than…."

Anything's better than below, Dean agrees silently. And Sam will be there. Dean sits up and leans a little into Sam's shoulder. "It'll be okay."

At two minutes to midnight, Dean watches Sam change. It's painless; he knows because it happens to him simultaneously. Neither can move, but they're close enough to watch each other's eyes. Sam's are wide with fear for only a moment, and then crease into sadness. His mouth is already covered over with bark. It's creeping over his nose, the nostrils becoming knots. His face is frozen. Dean wonders what his own eyes say to Sam. 

The last sight he sees is the strain leaving Sam's eyes, the pupils focusing in on him with determination and something like triumph. Dean is past breath, his throat a small, wooden hollow, or he would laugh. Yeah. Their roots twine around each other, their boughs brush gently in the breeze.

**End**.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hecate>


End file.
